If you use Linux and wanted to play Dota 2 but have been discouraged by the limited graphics performance of integrated Intel HD graphics card, this post is for you. Intel HD 3000 is an integrated graphics card that came with Sandybridge processors. By default it is barely able to run Dota 2. With following settings, you should be able to play Dota 2 at an average speed of 30 FPS or above. The trick is to lower the graphics settings to make the game run faster. If you have newer processors you should get even better performance.

1. Launch settings

Right click Dota 2 in steam Library and go to Properties->General->Set Launch Options and enter following text.

2. In game settings

Start the game and go to Options (gear icon on top left). In Video/Audio tab change following settings.

In VIDEO->ADVANCED un-checkall the check boxes. Set Shadow Quality to Low and Texture Quality to Med. Though not required, it is good idea to restart the game. After restart, if the game does not run at a playable speed, you can go back to VIDEO-> GENERAL tab and reduce the aspect ratio and resolution.

Dota 2 Reborn

Dota 2 Reborn does not run as good as Dota 2 (hero resolution too low, sudden lag). Since it is still in beta some bugs are expected. You can launch the game and lower the VIDEO setttings to see if you get a good game performance. In the Option menu, select Use advanced settings and set Texture Quality to Low and Game Screen Render Quality to lowest by dragging the range bar to left. Since I could not run commands (several console commands are missing) like net_graph 1, I could not show the FPS. After lowering the video setting, I was able to play games at a reasonable performance (with random lag, but not too much to ruin the game).

3. Direct launch.

You can create Dota 2 laucher by creating a launcher (right click) from Steam Library. It executes following command.

steam steam://rungameid/570

You can also run the game by executing above command from terminal.

4. Game performance is too low.

Even after all these settings if you get terrible performance in Dota 2, you can use the direction keys (defaults to left,right,up,down) to move in the game instead of mouse.

Conclusion

I hope this guide helped you increase performance of Dota 2 to a playable speed.

One thing I did not mention in the post is that setting the game to FullScreen rather than Windowed mode also helps improve the performance. In some desktop environments, setting to Fullscreen is the only way to get the game working (otherwise the desktop taskbar gets in the way).